Indian shuttler HS Prannoy notched up a thrilling three-game win over Commonwealth Games champion Parupalli Kashyap in an all-Indian final to clinch the US Open Grand Prix Gold at Anaheim, California. Prannoy beat Kashyap 21-15, 20-22, 21-12. This is Prannoy’s first final since playing and clinching the Swiss Open final last year. As per PTI report, Prannoy said,”It was a good match, pretty intense match, a high-quality match by both me and Kashyap. I think after losing the second game narrowly, I was calm and patient enough and it worked for me.” He added,”In second game, Kashyap was playing better than the first game. He was putting a lot of pressure on net and he was also finishing the lifts that I was producing, that made the whole difference. But in the third game, I changed my strategy a bit and I had a good lead. So yeah, overall happy with the tournament. Now I am looking forward to New Zealand Open.”

Notably, ever since bursting on to the scene with a silver medal at the 2010 Youth Olympics, Prannoy has been often left on the sidelines due to injuries, affecting his training and thereby his progress. He fought through a knee injury in 2011 and back injury in 2012 to reach the finals at the 2013 Tata Open. A series of semifinals at Bitburger, Syed Modi International, Macau and a final at Vietnam was followed by a maiden Grand Prix Gold win at Indonesia in 2014. Another injury-marred year followed but he still managed to reach a career-best world ranking of 12. He recovered to win the 2016 Swiss Open but again sustained a toe injury at the Singapore Open and subsequently missed the Thomas Cup.

He was in rampaging form at the Premier Badminton League this year but injuries to his knee and toe once again came back to haunt him.Meanwhile, In the women’s singles of the tournament, Japanese Aya Ohori won the final beating Michelle Li of Canada.